Both Rage and Humor
by Girl With a Pearl Earring
Summary: It's not until Axel glances over Roxas' shoulder and notices Sora and Riku leaving together with dubious, concerned expressions on their faces that he remembers he hasn't seen her since they were on stage together. AU, Rated T for romantic dalliance.


A/N: I'm not sure why my first descriptive kiss scene decided to be for this pairing, but whatever. This is part of a special musical AU that exists in my head in which all the KH characters are musically inclined and put on musicals/operas/whatever else about twice a year. And Kairi's a kick-ass singer. Enjoy!

It's not until Axel glances over Roxas' shoulder and notices Sora and Riku leaving together with dubious, concerned expressions on their faces that he remembers he hasn't seen her since they were on stage together. It takes about ten more minutes of idle talk for Naminé to emerge from the dressing room, though why it even took that long Axel has no idea. It's not even like she has to put on more than a thin layer of powder to get that sickly English girl look anyway.

"Sorry," she murmurs by Roxas' shoulder, somehow managing to look shy and direct at once, "Yuffie was trying out her pep-talk and I got caught in the middle of it."

Roxas doesn't exactly smile, but there's enough of a tilt to his lips that Axel knows he's completely forgotten he was in the middle of a sentence. He almost holds out his hand (Axel catches the odd incomplete wave motion by his side), but instead nods toward the door. When Naminé hesitates and glances back at Axel, Roxas suddenly remembers his best friend's existence.

"Oh, you wanna come?" he asks with smile completely at odds with the warning look in his eyes.

Axel grins. "Nah, you guys have fun. I've still got some stuff to do around here."

It takes all of ten seconds for Roxas to negotiate around Naminé's quiet protests and escort her out the door, leaving Axel alone in the dusty back-stage area. Axel sighs, half of him wanting desperately to leave and find some food, but instead he slowly walks further into the theater, masking his footsteps with strategically placed dust bunnies.

He finds her in a new corner (she never chooses just one place), sitting half-curled into herself, her hands clutching her elbows as her feet swing very slowly below her. He stands in the shadows for a moment, contemplating why he's even here, then steps decisively forward onto a dust bunny-free space.

She swings her head up at the sound, her eyes narrowing almost before she looks at him. Then, surprisingly, she sighs softly and swings it back down, her voice almost as mellow as Naminé's. "What do you want, Axel?"

Well. This is new.

He sits next to her, not too close but probably closer than she'd like, and notices again how much longer her legs are than a few years ago.

"That bad, huh?" His tone isn't as condescending as usual, but enough for her mouth and eyebrows to tighten. Then, another surprise, they loosen as her lips drift into a strange smirk.

"I just don't understand why this is so hard for me. It shouldn't be. I mean, it's not even a difficult part to sing..."

"Well, Yuffie didn't have a problem with the singing, did she? It was the acting."

The smirk takes on a self-deprecating quality as she huffs quietly and shakes her head until her chin is almost resting on her chest.

"It would figure," she mumbles pathetically to the floor. "I can get through a million other roles just fine, but the minute I'm paired up with you—"

"Kairi."

She doesn't move her head, but her eyes glance up, a slit of blue in the dusty room. He leans back on his hands to look at the ceiling ropes, all but invisible in the shadows; anything but at her face.

"...You're a great singer." He feels her stiffen immediately, her head snapping up with a strange jerky movement.

"And you're also a good actress." This time he does look at her, sliding his eyes toward her warily flattered expression.

She's quiet for a few moments, obviously waiting for the next sentence. When it doesn't come, her expression shifts toward wary anger. "Okay, what gives? You're freaking me out."

He grins, a quick flash of teeth, and rolls his head fully toward her. "What, I'm not allowed to compliment you?"

"Not unless there's an insult attached to it," she answers immediately, eyes finally gaining that familiar spark.

He laughs then, a quiet noise with more air than sound. "Alright. You wanna know what your problem is?"

Giving him a half eye roll, she opens her mouth to speak but he cuts across her before she can. Leaning closer and giving her a disgusted look, he says, "You're too sweet." He enunciates the last 't' so that the air rings for a moment before she slips back into her warily confused look.

"Mrs. Lovett isn't." He considers this for a moment, then adds, "Well, maybe sickly-poisonous sweet."

Now she just looks puzzled. "What do you mean?"

"I mean, the greatest challenge for any actor is to play a character they have nothing in common with."

"Oh," she says quietly, dejected, "I know."

"So all you have to do is get into that character and—"

"But what if I lose myself in the process?" She looks more like she's asking herself than him, gazing out to the main stage but not really seeing it.

He scoffs, grinning again. "C'mon, don't you have a stronger sense of self than that?"

She stands up quickly, looking more drawn than he's ever seen her. "I should go," she mutters, starting toward the main exit.

He can't figure out what just went wrong, but for some bizarre reason, he can't just let it go. Not like this. So before he knows what he's doing, he's called after her.

She stops reluctantly, her feet dragging a few steps ahead before they still. She doesn't turn exactly, just crosses her arms and angles her head toward the wall. "What?"

He stands slowly, allowing his feet to glide more than step toward her. "I think you shouldn't be so hard on yourself. After all, most people don't think you're that one-dimensional."

Her arms snap to her sides, fists pulling the muscles taut as she glares at him over her shoulder. He just grins recklessly and finishes, "Myself, for one."

She spins around, arms folding over her stomach once again. "Of course. The night just wouldn't be complete without a backhanded compliment, would it?"

He continues as if she hadn't spoken, still moving slowly toward her. "No. See, I think you're not just nice and honest and sweet," he drawls, making each adjective sound like horrible sins.

She puts her hands up as she backs away from him, unsure as to what's going on. He just moves relentlessly forward, punctuating each word with a step. "But I also think you're fiery"—another step back—"stubborn"—her heel hits the wall—"and fierce." The last word comes out in a hiss as she backs into the wall with a gasp, abruptly finding his arms trapping her on either side.

She swallows, her mouth suddenly dry. "Wh—" she licks her lips, wondering at her croaking voice, "What're you doing?"

He grins, his eyes sparking very close to her own. "Finding the other side," he whispers.

It seems to take an extraordinary amount of time for the next few seconds to pass. At the end of them, she finds herself with her hands against Axel's chest, originally there to push him away but she finds her wrists weakening with each fluid brush of his lips against hers. When he mouths at her lower lip with just a hint of teeth, her wrists give out with a wave of numbness and she's suddenly pressing herself closer. One of his hands slips up her spine beneath her shirt to pull her in as the other moves smoothly into her hair.

Her arms go up and around his neck as she all but crushes herself against him and she can't get any closer, it's not possible, but he's still just toying with her lips with a little friction here and a little there and it's not enough so why doesn't he do something? Sighing angrily into his mouth, she takes matters into her own hands as she bites down (a little harder than necessary) on his lower lip and licks at the seam of his lips. Finally, finally, she hears a low sound in his throat as he surges forward, openly moving into her mouth to test the slide of her tongue, to bite down just enough, right _there_, to learn what makes her gasp, moan, scramble closer to him as he...

"Whoa! That's one thing I didn't need to see tonight!" Yuffie's strident voice sears into Kairi's awareness as she jumps away, banging her elbow painfully against the wall, all to aware of her swollen lips and flushing face.

Axel merely takes a casual step back, smirking at nothing in particular and generally making it look as if getting caught kissing the living daylights out of your costar was an everyday occurrence.

"When I said 'get more comfortable with one another,' I didn't mean like that!" Yuffie exclaims, scrubbing at her eyes as if to rub away what she'd just walked in on.

"Sorry, Yuff," Axel drawls, smirking infuriatingly at Kairi. "Honestly, I didn't know she had it in her to jump me like that."

Kairi feels her cheeks flame even redder as she furiously stomps her foot and huffs away, glaring in embarrassment and anger. Axel trails after her, grinning triumphantly and completely ignoring the now slack-jawed Yuffie.

"This better not affect tomorrow's rehearsal!" she calls after him as he disappears through the door. His response is a casual finger salute. Yuffie can just barely hear Kairi start reaming into him right before the door slams shut.

Endnote: If you couldn't guess, they're in production for the musical Sweeney Todd, with Axel playing Todd and Kairi playing Lovett. And you can't tell me Yuffie wouldn't be an awesome director.


End file.
